"Bora Bora You Beauty"! The sounds whispered through my lips as I gazed down at what some consider to be the most beautiful of all islands in French Polynesia, and some would say the World. Bathed under a bright Polynesian sun the colors of the lagoon sparkled, introducing shades of Blue I never though existed. I felt like I could almost reach out and touch it. But it had been a long time coming, 16yrs in fact. On that late Summer day in 2008 when both my wife Terri, and I embarked on our journey with the respective "I do's" we swore back then that we would one day sit on a Motu, the fringing islands, of the famous Bora Bora lagoon, sipping cocktails and loving life.Happy to say we have now ticked that off of our itinerary. And what a blast it was...

Bora Bora seen from the vantage point of a single seat aircraft that I chartered for photography around the island.

Planning for the trip started way back in April 2023. We knew we wanted to do Bora Bora but we also wanted to see other islands in the region. We opted for Moorea, Maupiti, Taha'a and Raiatea. These were all to be visited over the two week period allotted for the trip. We would also be joined by our 11yr old son, Joshua, who was chomping at the bit to see and swim with Sharks, Stingrays and Manta Rays. He wasn't disappointed. We also took to heart the fact that Air Tahiti Nui had a somewhat negative reputation for canceling or shifting flights around with little, if any, notice. To that end we opted not to look for an immediate connection through to Bora Bora with our flight arriving from Tokyo, Japan. Rather, we opted for a two day buffer in Moorea which we reached by Ferry from Papeete once we'd collected all of our gear from baggage claim and cleared through customs and immigration. On Moorea we then picked up a rental car and made our way to the AirBnB we had opted for in the South West of the island.

First Stop Moorea

The dramatic peaks of Moorea.

For me I always saw and thought of Moorea as a stepping stone to the further islands. I didn't personally see the appeal of Moorea. I'd heard the local beaches were not that great and the shallows of said beaches were prone to being the realm of Stone Fish. The last thing we wanted was for someone to step on one of those suckers and be laid up for days especially seeing as Bora Bora was our next stop. Thus we opted to tour the island by car, stopping every now and then for photo ops and snooping what public access beaches we could find, which in truth were not that many. We could have been looking in the wrong places but it seemed a lot of the best beaches were those occupied by resorts or on private family lands.

This was also the first time I'd driven a stick shift car for about 20 or so years, and on the 'wrong' side of the road too. It all took a quick baptism by fire to get back into the hang of it. What did stand out though was the dramatic skyline of the island. We experienced that even more given that we took on, and completed, what we called "Pineapple Alley", much to the detriment of our rental vehicle.

Following farm tracks and rutted walkways we meandered our way through a segment of the island that seemed to be the epicenter for Pineapple cultivation. They were everywhere. This was not really the kind if ground I would use my rear view but after a time I found were the head of a convoy of ATV's. Well I like to think I was the lead of the convoy as opposed to the lost tourist on a track where other tourists would zoom down in their rented quad bikes with mud flying and the scenery swishing past. I'm now wondering of I am the focus of a blog post being penned by one of said ATV riders? The lost tourist who ruined our ATV tour in Moorea? Oh joy. Our two day stop on Moorea flashed by, as stunning as the island is, I was looking forward to the next stop. Moorea enabled us to get to grips with the jetlag and sort out our luggage to make sure it was all within the weight limits for our impending flight. Game on.

"Bora Bora You Beauty"!

Our flight was called and we found ourselves walking out onto the tarmac to board our awaiting ride. Having returned from Moorea without issue, even the car rental company were fine with the small amount of dirt on the outside of the car, most it seems in Tahiti are not. Another way to gouge a little more from renters it seemed. As we were in an open seating plan, meaning one could choose where they sat as they boarded we opted to sit on the right side of the aircraft hoping that would afford us the best view as we flew over and landed in Bora Bora. We chose wrong. While we did get some views of the island from the sky the squeals of joy and wonderment emerging from those sat on the left side of the plane reinforced the chagrin of our seat choice.

Air Tahiti Ferry to Vaitape at the airport.

Unlike many we had opted to spend the majority of our time in an accommodation option on the main island. Oa Oa Lodge is a waterfront option just a five minute walk to the North of the main town of Vaitape. Once we had exited the airport which is located on its own little island we then caught the complimentary Air Tahiti transfer ferry to the main port where we were then met by the representative of our hotel. As had landed mid afternoon we simply got our bags into our garden cottage, threw on our boardshorts and bikini for Terri and hit the pool. The sun was out, the breeze was comfortable, and the skies were blue. Swimming in the shadow of the impressive Mt. Otemanu that dominated the skyline, we'd realized that we'd made it. We where finally in Bora Bora after all those years. And this was just the start of the adventure.

During the process of our planning I'd reached out to one of the few professional photographers based in Bora Bora for some advice. Little did I know back then that Stephan, and his partner Bonnie, from Bora Bora Photo and Video, would go on to become very close and dear friends to our family. Stephan graciously put up with my endless questions over the months preceding our trip always happy to answer and give pointers and advice. Stephan was also gracious enough to set up our first full day excursion which would take place the day following our arrival. It is something that our son, Joshua, had been looking forward to for months. We had chartered a boat for the day to see all there was within the lagoon of Bora Bora but more importantly it would allow us to spend time at a couple of very specific locations within the lagoon at times when other regular excursion boats would have already departed. These two spots were those where we could get up close and personal with Black Tip Reef Sharks and Stingrays. Things were about to get wild.

Bring On the Sharks!

Our private boat charter day started off as if in a dream state. The Ocean was as calm and reflective as a looking glass. Underwater visibility, from what we could make out as we sped across a gin clear lagoon, it seemed was endless, the skies were blue, a few errant clouds littering an otherwise endless blue tapestry. It couldn't get any better, and it rarely did, according to Stephane and Bonnie who had joined us at our request. Our boat was provided by one of the local Taxi Boat companies namely Manu Taxi Boat service. That was owner by a friend of Stephane and who also owned the small Motu, where we would be having lunch that day. For now our thoughts and plans were all about what was on the cards for the days activities. I'd been teasing Josh about throwing him to the sharks on this date, he was about for finally come face to face with his favorite animal.

Stephane from Bora Bora Photo and Video, the perfect model.

First things first though. I'd schlepped my 16" Dome Port half way around the World for the chance to shoot split water photography throughout this trip, and this excursion screamed out for that. I wanted to make sure I had the settings, especially the focus nailed for what was to come.

OK so for some of the technical photography stuff. When using a large dome for split water photography, due to the physics between the dome and the lens used will mean that the two will create what is called a virtual image. This virtual image is invisible to the human eye and is projected to a point in front of the physical dome port. By taking the size of the dome port, the width of what is called the pupil entry point of the lens, the width of the channel that allows light into the lens, and the focal length of the lens one can calculate the projection point of the virtual image. In my case as I had a Laowa 12mm f2,8 super wide lens on my Canon EOS5DSr my virtual image sits at 49.9cm from the image sensor of my camera. By setting that on my manual lens I could ensure everything was tack sharp in the image.

This first dip, before we welcomed the stars of the show was to test that everything was set and good to go. What better model could I have in the warm and inviting shallows than Stephane who was swimming around grabbing imagery for himself I'm sure happy to have a day without any stress on this perfect day afloat in the lagoon of Bora Bora. Right, let's get down to business.

The stars of the show, Blacktip Reef Sharks are plentiful throughout French Polynesia and are treated almost puppy dog like by the locals.

Our anchor was set over a patch of the lagoon devoid of rocks or reef. The light reflecting from the sand doubled down with the camera settings as I was set to f16 to avoid refraction of the imagery. Refraction being when things look like they are bending when you look at them sideways on through the water level, like a pencil in a glass for example. A small aperture, that needs a lot of light, is then used to eliminate that from happening. Jumping into the water I wanted to try and get some shots with just the sharks without anyone in the frame. It wasn't long before they showed up. Blacktip reef sharks, probably one of the most plentiful of all shark species in French Polynesia are the stars of the show. Two came cruising in, 'Snap' the shutter closed, nailed the shot (above). Over the next five to ten minutes I got shot after shot as up to five sharks started circling me. "Right Josh, you're up".

Terri and Josh hanging with the locals in the Bora Bora Lagoon.

I couldn't even finish the sentence before I heard the tell tale 'Splash' as Josh entered the water, followed closely by his mother Terri, no doubt guarding her young like the proverbial mother hen. Both Terri and I have extensive knowledge and experience with sharks. We are both SCUBA Instructor trained and have worked respectively in some of the best tropical locations around the planet where sharks are a mainstay of the diving scene. During my time as an underwater cameraman with National Geographic I also got to work and shoot with Tiger and Great White sharks over extended periods. With this understanding of sharks we were more than happy for Josh to be left to his own devices in the company of the sharks we now found within our presence. He pretty soon got used to them. We found the best way to interact with them was to simply be as still as possible and they would simply swim between us. At times they would flick and take flight once they realized they were literally inches away from a human, or my dome port.

We stayed photographing these excitable little sharks for some 45minutes or so. By this time I was fast burning through a 64GB SD Card. No worries as I also had a 128GB CF Card loaded into the camera too. A couple of times we had to remind josh not to reach out with his nice white and reflective 11yr old hands. Sharks don't have the best eyesight and the contrast of his hands against the underwater scenery could very well lead to a case of mistaken identity. Not something we wanted to have to deal with. The day was well underway and there was more to come.

We'd had the sharks pretty much all to ourselves for the best part of 45minutes when we saw a couple of excursion boats heading our way. We decided to up our anchor and go in search of another wild critter that soon replaced sharks as Josh' favorite encounter thus far. I took my time getting out of the water. Irrespective as to the countless hundreds of hours I've been in the company of sharks of all sizes over the past 30years or so, I relish every moment in their presence, whether they're the small 1.5m pocket rockets like these Blacktips or lumbering and more methodical pace of larger species such as Tiger or Great White. Retreating to the boat so I could keep the sun on the sharks as they circled I fired a last batch of shots. Handing my camera rig up to Stephane I reluctantly exited the water and off we went, in search of more adventures.

And with a flick of the tail they were gone. Clambering out of the water and with our anchor weighed, we set off for adventures new.

Gathering speed we could just about make out the squeals of excitement from the folks who had just replaced us at the shark spot. and for good reason, it's an awesome experience, especially for younger family members looking for their first up close and personal shark experience. Alas, we were now heading to another shallow, sandy floored lagoon playground where another member of the shark family awaited our presence. I'd heard someone once refer to them as 'Polynesian Pancakes' but to me Stingrays are an awesome subject to photograph and interact with when done correctly. Like sharks they demand respect and space when needed. Round two, the Stingray experience in the lagoon of Bora Bora.

A story best told in its entirety on another day. Watch this space. "Bora Bora You Beauty"!

"Wherever you go, go with all your heart".

Confucius - Chinese Philosopher